Reeds in the Wind

Canne al vento · Reeds in the Wind · published 1913 · ISBN 9788817022088

Grazia Deledda — Grazia Deledda (1871 – 1936) — Italy, writing in Italian. Awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1926.

“for her idealistically inspired writings which with plastic clarity picture the life on her native island and with depth and sympathy deal with human problems in general” — The Nobel Committee citation

About Grazia Deledda

Italian writer born in Nuoro, in the mountains of Sardinia, and the second woman to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature after Selma Lagerlöf. Local custom allowed girls only four years of school; she taught herself standard Italian and read her way through European literature alone. Almost her entire body of work is set in Sardinia — a world with its own law, its own sins and its own ways of atoning, which she wrote not as folklore but as tragedy.

How it came to be

Deledda wrote the book in 1913, by which time she had left Sardinia for Rome but still wrote almost exclusively about home. It is generally taken to be her finest novel and was central to the case that brought her the Nobel Prize in 1926. The Italian original is in the public domain.

Summary of Reeds in the Wind

Three Pintor sisters live in a crumbling house in Sardinia, keeping up a noble name that ran out of money long ago. Efix, their servant, has stayed with them all his life because of an old guilt only he knows: he had a hand in their father's death, on the night he helped the youngest daughter run away. Then Giacinto, the nephew from the mainland, comes looking for them — bringing debts, lies, and one last chance for any of it to be said aloud.

Analysis & legacy

The title states the theme outright: people are reeds in the wind, bent by fate but not quite broken. What is good is that Deledda does not use the image to excuse resignation. Efix carries his guilt for decades and punishes himself with labour, pilgrimage and self-denial — but the book gradually reveals that most of that punishment is his own construction, and that what he fears is not being punished but being forgiven. Religion works the same way here: it is braided into the island's pre-Christian beliefs, the panas, the night spirits, the festivals where saints and fairies are equally present. Deledda renders the Sardinian landscape — stone, wind, the vineyards along the stream — with almost tactile precision, yet she never turns the island into a picturesque stage for mainland readers. Here poverty has its economics, honour has its price, and a family can come apart simply because nobody dares say one sentence.

Themes: Guilt and atonement · Sardinia · Fate · A family in decline · Folk belief

Rating: 3.5/5 from 2 ratings (Open Library).

What critics say

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Frequently asked questions

What is Reeds in the Wind about?

Three Pintor sisters live in a crumbling house in Sardinia, keeping up a noble name that ran out of money long ago. Efix, their servant, has stayed with them all his life because of an old guilt only he knows: he had a hand in their father's death, on the night he helped the youngest daughter run…

Is Reeds in the Wind worth reading?

On booknest, Reeds in the Wind is rated 3.5/5 from 2 ratings on Open Library. The title states the theme outright: people are reeds in the wind, bent by fate but not quite broken. What is good is that Deledda does not use the image to excuse resignation. Efix carries his guilt for decades and…

When did Grazia Deledda win the Nobel Prize, and why?

Grazia Deledda won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1926: “for her idealistically inspired writings which with plastic clarity picture the life on her native island and with depth and sympathy deal with human problems in general”

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